Talking about movies...

Digging in my old notes, I find the following set down as my all-time favorite movies, and thought I would share it in partial expiation for having experienced Crank:

• Casablanca
  Okay, so shoot me. I adore this film. Over the years, I have not tired of it, and have lost track of the number of times I've seen it. I enjoy watching it and manage to glean some new nuance from the screenplay every time I do. I know people who have memorized long sections of dialog, and am proud to count them among my friends.

  There are a number of memorable scenes and lines in this movie. Have you ever heard anyone say: "I'm shocked! Shocked! To find <such-and-so> going on in this establishment!" (that, or something close)? Well, that's one of Captain Louis Renault's lines in the movie. Another of Renault's lines - "Round up the usual suspects!" - should be familiar to many.
  
  Familiar, too, should be Bogart's famous toasting line "Here's looking at you, kid!" and his cry of despair, "Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine!" And who can forget the scene where voices are raised to sing the Marseillaise to drown out the German officers singing Die Wacht am Rhein?
  
  Among my earliest memorable recollections of this movie is an exchange between Rick (played by Humphrey Bogart) and German Major Heinrich Strasser (played by Conrad Veidt). Strasser, who has been needling Blaine about the Germans occupying Paris and possibly London, presses on and asks how Rick would feel about the Germans being in New York. "Well," quips Rick with mock seriousness, "there are certain sections of New York, Major, that I wouldn't advise you to try to invade." How true.

  Another exchange that struck a chord within me early on in my acquaintance with this film occurs as Renault (played by Claude Rains) and Rick sit outside Rick's nightclub:

  Renault

  What in Heaven's name brought you to Casablanca?

  Rick

  My health. I came to Casablanca for the waters.

  Renault

  The waters? What waters? We're in the desert.

  Rick

  I was misinformed.

  Renault

  Hmph.

  That "Hmph" is very slight, but it speaks volumes (at least to me)!

• Cyrano de Bergerac
  I prefer the old version (with José Ferrer, filmed in 1950, for which Ferrer won an Academy Award) over the recent efforts starring Gerard Depardieux (in a film of the same name) and Steve Martin (in a film called Roxanne, described by a colleague of mine as "the cartoon version" of Cyrano), but these latter are watchable, too.

• My Favorite Year
  Another film I can watch repeatedly. Peter O'Toole does a bang-up job at playing over-the-hill screen idol Alan Swann, and you can see Mark Linn-Baker (who plays one Benjy Stone) before he went on to star in the hit comedy series Perfect Strangers.
  
  My favorite lines in the movie come when Swann admits to Benjy that he's afraid. His fear kept him from visiting his small daughter, and his fear is keeping him from going on a television stage before a live audience.
  

  Benjy Stone

  Alan Swann, afraid? The Defender of the Crown? Captain from Tortuga? The Last Knight of the Round Table?

  Alan Swann

  Those are movies, damn you! Look at me! I'm flesh and blood, life-size, no larger! I'm not that silly God-damned hero! I never was!

  Benjy Stone

  To me you were! Whoever you were in those movies, those silly goddamn heroes meant a lot to me! What does it matter if it was an illusion? It worked! So don't tell me this is you "life-size." I can't use you "life-size." I need Alan Swanns as big as I can get them! And let me tell you something: you couldn't have convinced me the way you did unless somewhere in you you had that courage! Nobody's that good an actor! You are that silly goddamn hero!

  Yes, indeed, I think we all can use our Alan Swanns as large as we can get them!


• Inherit the Wind
  Besides great performances by Spencer Tracy and Fredrick March, this film successfully tackles something that few, if any films do today: it depicts a battle of ideas. And it does so without gunfire, high-speed car chases, explosions, or other mayhem. This film could never be made today.

Sometime, when I have the time, I shall have to "officially" add Bad Day at Black Rock and Singin' in the Rain (and perhaps even Белое сольнце пустыни, which translates as White Sun of the Desert) to the list.

And now, to involve myself in a little outside endeavor.

Cheers...